Three children grazing their sheep were killed in mortar shelling by the occupying Turkish army in al-Fatsa village of Ain Issa on Sunday.

The children killed in the attack were identified as Muslit Zaki El-Xedîp (13), Resûl Munadî El-Xedîp (13) and Feysel Xazî El-Xedîp (13).

Ain Issa is located south of the Turkish occupation zone and is strategically important as a link between the cantons of Euphrates and Cizîrê. Since 2019, the city has been in the crosshairs of Turkey and its Islamist proxy forces as part of a war of attrition, with phases of high intensity alternating with phases of low intensity. Dozens of villages in the region have already been destroyed and depopulated by Turkish military violence. Several Turkish air offensives in 2022 and 2023 reduced large parts of the infrastructure to ashes and rubble.

Last September, the water supply was cut off in around fifty villages in the east of Ain Issa after the Turkish army bombed the region. In August, two civilians were wounded by sniper fire from the occupying troops. The month before, a road worker was killed by an artillery attack. In all cases, the source of the attacks was the Turkish jihadist occupation zone in northern Syria.